The Nikon D-80
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There is no further excuses for botched pictures with this, is there? Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, okay, I know; you have to have 'the eye'. You have to 'see' the scene. I know all that. What I'm talking here is if I have the eye & can see the scene, why won't my camera allow me to grab it? Because it's *correcting* what my vision is & giving me the acceptible pedestrian snapshot. Well, hopefully no more.
For so long I've mourned the disuse of my dear old Nikon FE & for no other reason than that it used film. I adored this camera; still do. But without a dark room & having to rely on others to develop my photos, I became increasingly melancholy & gradually admitted that it was time to retire my old pal. In spite of this tho' I believe film is still the best. People have been using film for more than 100 years, both for still photography & to make movies. Despite its long history, film remains the best way to capture still & moving pictures in my opinion, because of its incredible ability to record detail in a very stable form.
There is something magical about the process too, we're very visual creatures, & a picture really does paint a thousand words for us! Perfection has little to do with that in the main...unless you're a photographer. 'Course then your opinion of perfection usually veers far from others idea of this.
One of the best shots I ever got was of a mouse coming out from under a newspaper in the street. The only thing visible (to others) was a discarded, tented newspaper lying on a sidewalk & a cat sitting on a stone step nearby. But to photographers there was peril in that photo & it could be felt, you just had to "look" at the picture. On closer inspection there in the black was something glinting at center bottom. You see it's a tiny black eye peering out to see if all is safe to leave his haven. This was a photo that I had to repeatedly harp at the camera store clerk to develop tho' he insisted it was a bad exposure. The bad exposure won me third prize at the UTSC photo contest. A very tough contest I might add.
Also I'm sure with the evolution of the camera & it's method, we will always hear that what that went before was better. That too, is human nature. From the copper plates of daguerreotype to the wetplate process of ferrotype (tintype) then ambrotype, someone is going to insist that they were the best of the best. Perhaps for what they were called upon to do, they were & we can be thankful that they were around to capture history. I wonder will the digital? It remains to be seem but with the ease of use, we may not want much of it to stick around. 
So the quest then was for me to find the perfect digital. Not a simple task with so many simple point & clicks on the market. I was shopping for one with enough versatility to allow me my artistic quirks..such as they are. In other words, get rid of the automatic & give me manual. Or a manual option at least.
I had already gone through four of the small digital cameras & I can't say that any were bad; just not adequate to satisfy my SLR need.
My last two, the Olympus D-630; then the much better Nikon Coolpix P4 enabled me to capture the moment so to speak. But did nothing for my visions. How I wanted it captured. Sure, get grannie dressed to the nines for the wedding...get the wedding for that matter. But after that what?
Alright, so moving along to my new toy & a sampling of home & pets. Yes, I lived in Vegas. Well, not on the Strip of course, but still just a 20 minute toot in.
How many photos of this do you suppose have been taken?
The Las Vegas Strip:
The Bellagio fountains:
The glass umbrellas on the ceiling of the Bellagio lobby:
The Luxor with laser pyramid:
3 miles from my house & 122 degrees in the shade: (what shade you may ask)
...and from the blast furnace to the mist, a January Pennsylvania dawn by contrast.
And last but not least, two kitties after having made merry on Christmas day. The opening of toys, the treats to sample, the turkey, the gravy, the catnip....zzzzz...zzz...snick! If that's Christmas, they've had it!
First Jake...
..closing in...
And then Darius...nefarious Darius...
Lastly we have skeptical Bailey. He finally ventures out from under the bed to face a new terror; a camera with a flash. Aah well; Mama's new toys...
More photos can be found by clicking here
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